Third Sector

Lucinda and Emily are joined by the digital specialist Zoe Amar and Karen Marter, head of technology strategy at the British Heart Foundation. Zoe outlines key developments in the AI space over the past year and how charities are reacting to them, including the use of virtual assistants in working life. She stresses the need for a sector-level response to the increasing normalisation of AI usage.&...

In a world where need is spiralling out of control and new, radical forces are shaping the landscape for doing good, can charity be the answer to the world’s social and environmental problems? Lucinda Rouse presents The End of Charity, a new podcast series from the makers of Third Sector.   Guided by some of the leading voices of the philanthropy world, as well as radicals who believe the cur...

Lucinda and Emily are joined by Charmaine Griffiths, chief executive of the British Heart Foundation, to reflect on the voluntary sector’s female-dominated workforce and the challenges facing women on their path to senior leadership positions. Charmaine stresses her conviction that charities need to be representative of the communities they exist to support. She describes heart disease as a diseas...

Lucinda and Emily are joined by Anaish Yilma-Parmar, head of legacies at the British Red Cross, and Lucinda Frostick, director at Remember a Charity. Lucinda (Frostick) provides an overview of the legacy market, worth more than £4bn annually, and expectations for further growth in spite of current economic challenges and a probate backlog. Anaish describes how the British Red Cross takes a collabo...

Lucinda and Andy are joined by Liz Tait, fundraising director at Great Ormond Street Hospital Children’s Charity, to discuss progress with the charity’s biggest and most ambitious fundraising appeal to date. Liz describes the planning process, including the use of campaign peaks to structure and maintain momentum during the multi-year appeal. She provides insight into Gosh Charity’s use of new fun...

Lucinda and Emily are joined by Suzy Edington, fundraising consultant at JustGiving, and Ellie Putt, senior participant experience manager at the Alzheimer’s Society. Suzy outlines the changes in fundraising behaviour on the JustGiving platform since the Covid-19 pandemic, with greater volumes of smaller donations and rising levels of regular giving contributing to revenue growth in 2023. Ellie ex...

Lucinda and Andy are joined by the organisational psychologist and author Dr Susan Hetrick to discuss the drivers of and barriers to workplace toxicity. Susan identifies unreasonable performance pressures as a key trigger for organisational toxicity. She explains the terms 'normalisation of deviance' and 'cognitive dissonance', which are the key drivers of a toxic working environment. She stresses...

Lucinda and Emily are joined by Hatty Evans, head of brand and marketing at Magic Breakfast, and Georgie Howlett, managing director of Stand Agency, to discuss the importance of language in appealing to donors and service users. Hatty explains how Magic Breakfast, which works to end morning hunger in schools, takes different approaches in its messaging to teachers, parents and donors, emphasising...

Lucinda and Andy dissect a recent speech delivered by the Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer to charity bosses, in which he pledged to reset the relationship between the government and the voluntary sector should his party win the next general election.  Senior news reporter Emily Harle joins Lucinda to explore some of the causes and solutions to burnout affecting charity social media teams. They...

Lucinda and Emily are joined by Ashling Cashmore, head of impact and advisory at the Charities Aid Foundation, and Mandy Rollins, chief executive of Disability Solutions West Midlands. Ashling explains the six characteristics of a resilient charity, as described in a framework formulated by CAF to guide charities on a strengthening journey. These include effective leadership, financial and operati...

Lucinda and Emily are joined by Tom MacInnes, chief analyst at Citizens Advice, to discuss how the charity is using its unique position to improve understanding of the cost-of-living crisis. Tom explains how his team used client enquiry data to identify rising energy and private rental costs as two of the most significant drivers. He highlights the growing trend of clients approaching Citizens Adv...

Lucinda and Emily are joined by Jane Ide, chief executive of Acevo, and Sue Tibballs, chief executive of the Sheila McKechnie Foundation, to discuss some of the themes and challenges facing the voluntary sector in 2024. These include the upcoming general election and its implications for the sector; the growing trend of charity closures; and opportunities for collaboration, both within the volunta...

Lucinda, Andy and Emily discuss the leading stories and trends from the voluntary sector in 2023. Lucinda delivers an against-the-clock round-up of the year’s charity news before the three discuss their selected top stories. These include the closure announcements by Children England and Lankelly Chase - for very different reasons - and the success of the Big Help Out volunteering initiative. They...

Lucinda and Emily are joined by Ian Joseph, managing director of Trustees Unlimited, to talk about what charities need to think about when creating an effective board.  Ian describes the key qualities of a good trustee, from having an emotional connection to a charity’s cause to humility, courage and conscientiousness. He provides pointers on how to find the right trustee, starting with a cha...

Lucinda and Andy are joined by Miriam Turner, co-executive director of Friends of the Earth, and Victoria Benson, chief executive of the single-parent support charity Gingerbread, to discuss their respective organisations’ move to a four-day working week. Miriam explains how the change is helping to strengthen the environmental justice movement by enabling a more diverse staff body to further the...

Lucinda and Emily are joined by Julie Bentley, chief executive of Samaritans, to find out how the charity has rebuilt its volunteer base after it shrank by 30 per cent during the Covid-19 pandemic. Julie describes how Samaritans’ more flexible volunteering packages aim to attract volunteers from all corners of society. She provides her views on the campaigning climate for charities, and the need f...

Lucinda and Rory are joined by Wajid Akhter, founder of Charity Week, a student and volunteer-led campaign of Islamic Relief, and Harry Twohig, communities officer at the Brilliant Club, to discuss how charities can tap into students’ inclination to support societal causes. Wajid outlines the aims of Charity Week, which he established in 2000, and describes how its partner charity, Islamic Relief,...

From the team at Third Sector comes  The Diff  – a new podcast that spotlights the work of small charities and not-for-profits. In the final episode of its pilot series, The Diff visits the Synergy Theatre Project to hear about its work with prisoners and ex-prisoners. Guests explain how working with prisoners, ex-prisoners, young offenders and young people at risk of offending reve...

From the team at Third Sector comes The Diff – a new podcast that spotlights the work of small charities and not-for-profits. In the second episode of our pilot mini-series, airing 13-17 November, host Rhianna Dhillon learns how the first-aid charity StreetDoctors empowers young people to become part of the solution to knife crime. Volunteer and medical student Suleiman Shurafa gives a quick-...

From the team at Third Sector comes The Diff – a new podcast that spotlights the work of small charities and not-for-profits. In the first episode of our pilot mini-series, airing 13-17 November, we ask: what causes a knife crime epidemic – and what would it take to end one? Patrick Green, chief executive of the  Ben Kinsella Trust , and Nathaniel Peat, founder of the  Safety B...

Lucinda and Andy are joined by Katy Saunders, director at Social Finance, and Mark Jarman-Howe, chief executive of St Helena Hospice, to discuss how charities can make effective use of social investment mechanisms. Katy explains how the social investment market works and describes its growth over the past decade, presenting opportunities to charities to be both investors and recipients of social f...

Lucinda and Emily are joined by Rebecca Gray, chief executive of Maudsley Charity, a grant-maker for mental health projects. Rebecca describes how the recruitment of a new board in 2018 helped the charity to change its approach to funding across thematic, strategic programme areas with input from stakeholders to help influence the charity’s direction of travel. She explains how the charity balance...

Lucinda takes a look behind the scenes at Barnardo’s as she shadows a day in the life of Becky Rice, the charity’s senior policy adviser for mental health and wellbeing. Becky outlines the different aspects of her job: from conducting research to responding to government announcements and speaking to children, young people, practitioners and parents to ensure their perspectives and priorities are...

Lucinda and Rory are joined by Sophie Tebbetts, head of programmes at the food poverty charity FoodCycle, to learn about the different techniques used to attract and retain the charity’s 15,000 volunteers. Sophie explains how FoodCycle’s roots in universities have informed its volunteer strategy and enabled it to maintain a healthy roster of volunteers, most of whom fall within the 25 to 45 age ra...

Lucinda and Emily introduce The Diff: a new podcast from Third Sector, currently in its pilot stage, which champions the work of small charities, grassroots organisations and social enterprises working on the front line. The episode features snippets of conversations between The Diff’s host, Rhianna Dhillon, and five guests. These consist of Meg Doherty, founder of the social enterprise Fat Macy’s...